I've been meaning to share this here. There's a Facebook group now that openly discusses CC (without the censorship of nearly everywhere else but here). It's called "Let Us Reason For Real". www.facebook.com/groups/LetUsReasonForReal

For those here questioning CC, there's a Facebook group where lots of ex-CCers tell their stories. I posted it on another post about CC here, but I'll stop after this so as not to be annoying. I just think the FB group has such good info. Stuff you won't hear anywhere else, because negative reviews from people who have really been in deep in CC are so locked down usually. Here's the group: https://www.facebook.com/groups/2135913039963411/

It's not just the curriculum that I could critique, but I truly believe issues with the business add to the burnout. I'm part of a group on Facebook that often talks about this stuff. There are very happy CCers in there and some ex CCers who feel like they left a cult. It runs the gamut, but it's good info. https://www.facebook.com/groups/2135913039963411/

I think you are right that perhaps CC seeks to be the Common Core of homeschooling. This saddens me because most of the homeschoolers I know or knew before CC wanted to avoid that one-size-fits-all approach. Perhaps we need new designations: "Old School Homeschool" and - to use an acronym we used in the info tech industry - "COTS Homeschool". (Commercial, Off The Shelf) That's it. CC is a commercial, off the shelf way to homeschool. Except... So many - several who have commented here - don't want COTS homeschool. They want community, and CC is the only game in town. And once you've invested so much $$ in all the books and curriculum, you have no choice but to go with the COTS solution, which inadvertantly furthers and spreads that homeschool "common core" approach. And, as much as CC tries to control the "product" it's almost never implemented uniformly. Just look at the different stories on here of people who have tutors or directors who go against CC's stated policies. Directors with kids in PS (while CC dictates that all directors must have all their kids enrolled in CC), Challenge tutors with little kids (while CC dictates that any Challenge tutor must have at least one kid within one year of Challenge). Try as they might to strong arm directors into submission, I don't think their business model, where nearly every worker is supposedly an "independent contractor", allows the corporation the teeth to force that uniformity. So they're not even doing homeschool common core well! Just like public school common core...

I love the turn this post is now taking: encouraging and empowering homeschooling moms to create community where you are! It can be so simple. We had a small co-op that was academic - we met together and just did parts of our homeschooling together. The only fee were a few supplies for the art/craft time and insurance for the co-op that the house church asked us to get. I love the idea of a purely social co-op as well. We can do this. This is why we decided to homeschool. For freedom. Still, with one in high school I'm also looking forward to the college days. Ha. He is, too.

This is also my main concern with CC - other than the stories of spiritual and emotional abuse at the hands of CC "reps" (managers) - that it is changing in the face of homeschooling for the worse in so many areas. The desperation for community is so real and in many places now CC is the only choice. It has truly become, as Leigh Bortins said a couple of years ago in an article in Pilot online magazine: "The Walmart of education". (http://www.thepilot.com/business/at-classical-conversations-business-is-an-education/article_6520761e-321d-11e5-92ed-f7e9366ea8dd.html) And I even like Walmart. I just don't want it to be my only choice. It feels like CC is becoming a Christian homeschool community corporate monopoly.

That last paragraph on page 55 certainly echos a new-ish phenomenon/repeated phrase I keep reading from women in online CC and homeschool forums: "We wouldn't be able to homeschool without CC," "CC provides the accountability and mentorship I absolutely have to have to have to be able to homeschool at all." I'm hearing this so often now and it's almost word for word. Creepy. But I'm stuck on pg. 22 with the pretty stellar test score numbers of Challenge grads (except for 4-year college attendance - 72% is nothing to brag about IMO). I was impressed until I read the fine print: all scores were self-reported from a survey and there were... Twenty-four (24) respondents. LOL.

I agree with you and HSmomof2. I didn't think she's was saying you have to have a teaching degree to teach your own kids, but to teach other people's children effectively in a group setting requires some decent training. My CC trainer was considered one of the best in my state and yet I walked out of training with a LOT of knowledge about CC policies (enough that I knew I didn't want to sign a contract), how to draw my board with God in the center, and a few ideas for memory review games. That's. It. I was asked on my first day as a tutor by a new mom how God was at the center of CC's Foundations curriculum and all I had was, "Um. All knowledge comes from God." I also found out that the year after I tutored they started making tutors sign a non-disclosure agreement before they could even enter a tutoring room. I guess to get rid of pesky situations like me where I did tutor for my director but I didn't sign any of CC's gag orders so now they can't threaten me with being bound by an NDA that specifically mentions "discussions" about CC business. Just pull off any wool over your eyes, anyone reading this. Nearly an entire workforce of "independent contractors", an multi-level marketing hierarchy but the company claims to NOT be an MLM, completely monopolizing the Christian homeschooling scene in entire areas, and now actively recruiting unpaid volunteers for a for-profit corporation. Does *any* of that read "love for the Christian homeschooling community" more than "love for money" to you??

This all makes me so sad. Surely this is not why we decided to homeschool. This is why I believe CC is truly harming the homeschool community at large. It's sucking up resources - creating a monopoly. Don't even get me started on the rigid legalism. How much better is this really than public school? We trade the government for one "right way" to homeschool with "Christian" slapped onto the description. Much of what I saw in my years at CC was anything but Christian.

I'm just wondering how this "CC Brand Ambassador" program holds up in the face of the Fair Labor and Standards Act (FLSA). Google "FLSA volunteer for-profit". In that search an article pops up warning about a for-profit company using volunteers that was published by the very law firm CC retained to write and send the threat letter I received from the law firm on behalf of CC. I have that lawyer's email address, and I want to ask her about this. Would that be crazy?

It was unfortunately so strictly enforced at our campus that our director was having to find someone to drive one of her 5 children - a Challenge 2 aged student - to a campus 30 minutes away because it was the only Challenge 2 in the area but met on the same day as our F/E community day. (Director could not be in two places at once.) Of course, the reps' suggestion was not that the rule could be eased up on but that our director should recruit someone from our community to start more Challenge programs. So... that's a alternative theory as to why this is a corporate rule - not just to maintain the integrity of the program but to build new campuses ($$$). And when a second child of hers was miserable in Challenge A because of learning issues, there was *no* leniency to seek another program more suited to her other child's needs. Honestly, the intractability of corporate managers on this issue, along with about two other issues, is what ultimately drove our entire (full - 48 students) community to leave CC (except for the support manager and her best friend). I guess this is still a ymmv situation but I don't expect it to be for long. The long arm of corporate rules will eventually reach all CC communities.

It's absolutely stated policy and has been for at least 7 years. Here is the quote from CC's website: "In order to show commitment to the mission “To know God and to make Him known†through a classical education and to provide continuity to the progress of each program, each Director should enroll all of their age-appropriate children in a local community (if there is one within a 25-minute drive). Classical Conversations’ programs are a fit for the Director’s entire family." https://offer.classicalconversations.com/directors-info-landing-page/

Have you looked at Claritas or Scholé. CC does seem to need some good, healthy competition.

Argh! It said this has not posted and I can't delete it.

Well, whaddya know? I found this: https://classical-conversations.helpscoutdocs.com/article/40-who-can-be-a-tutor-for-classical-conversations It may be a very recent thing, since the article was updated in September of this year. I know two years ago when I tutored no directors or tutors in our area were background checked. The article does not say it's mandatory just that you "must submit to a background check", but it certainly seems like a step in the right direction... It is weird though that, according to that article I linked above, a Challenge director must have at least one child at or above that Challenge level, and I know at least one Challenge director, new this year, who definitely does not have a Challenge-aged child, so it does make one wonder how much of their own "rules" they are following/enforcing.